"The future is dangerous" - FabCity Summit 2018

17/07/2018

At this year’s Fab City summit, professor Carlos Moreno of the Sorbonne, painted a potentially grim picture of the future. “The future is dangerous” he declared, a prognosis which he had the maps and data to support. Speaking at the event, Saskia Sassen, who made a recent appearance in Brussels as part of the EUROCITIES Cities4Europe campaign, warned of the risks of letting the interests of international financial markets take precedence over the real human beings that live and work in cities.

Nathalie Guri, projects and knowledge sharing director of EUROCITIES, was present at the event to represent Sharing Cities. Mrs Guri can attest to the fact that it wasn’t all doom and gloom. Again and again during the summit the message surfaced, amongst the speakers and the 900-strong audience, that cities hold the power to create new paradigms for resilience, innovation, justice and inclusiveness.

To realise this power, the message was that large cities must take control of the data generated in their territories. This does not mean jeopardising resident’s ‘digital sovereignty’, but rather ensuring that data is opened up. This will allow government, citizens, universities, civil society and industry to cocreate solutions that work for everyone.